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Micro Acoustics 2002e, electret goodness on the SL1400 MKII. pics

Fasterdamnit

Fasterdamnit

Super Member
I know a few folks on here are MA, electret fans. I understand why. I repaired a turntable for a neighbor to give to his son and did some horse trading for this lovely cart. He decided he would rather have it in the hands of an appreciative vinyl addict than risk a rare cart in the hands of a 16 year old. His table now sports a sturdy Stanton 680EE. The 2002e is very listenable- not fatiguing in any way yet very good detail and dynamics. It is a good match for the Technics arm at 1.2 grams tracking. Tiny Beryllium cantilever and 0.2x0.7 nude elliptical stylus. I need to throw the Hi-Fi test record at it and see how well it tracks. I think it may be comparable to a HOMC. I will do some headshell swapping and compare to an AT20SLa and OM/Digi 200NE.

:music:

MicroAcoustics2002e002.jpg


MicroAcoustics2002e004.jpg
 
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The best sounding cart I ever owned. I still have one but the stylus is long gone and I can't find a replacement anywhere.
 
Maybe the Micro-Acoustics Demonstration Test Record would be the one to use. The cartridge should ace that 'fixed' test.

MATT2002: Transient and Tracking Ability Demonstration Test Record
Because good tracking isn't enough

It even has a couple score boards on the back to keep up with the results of the tests.

I really liked the 2002e. It is so quick that bluegrass and Magneplanars seem to be something that will sound great with that cartridge. I still have the cartridge but don't think the stylus is ready to go.

Nice track you made.
 
rnorton said:
The best sounding cart I ever owned. I still have one but the stylus is long gone and I can't find a replacement anywhere.
Click to expand...

Pricey-

http://www.adelcom.net/MicroAcousticsStylus1.htm :scratch2:

Blue Shadow said:
Maybe the Micro-Acoustics Demonstration Test Record would be the one to use. The cartridge should ace that 'fixed' test.

MATT2002: Transient and Tracking Ability Demonstration Test Record
Because good tracking isn't enough

It even has a couple score boards on the back to keep up with the results of the tests.

I really liked the 2002e. It is so quick that bluegrass and Magneplanars seem to be something that will sound great with that cartridge. I still have the cartridge but don't think the stylus is ready to go.

Nice track you made.
Click to expand...

Quick is a great description. Tomorrow I will play and report :thmbsp:
 
Nice horse trading, you done good!

I agree quick really applies to the MA, maybe more any other cartridge. I've got the 3002 and because the stylus are so unobtainable only play it as a special treat.

Dave/ChairSpud
 
ChairSpud said:
Nice horse trading, you done good!

I agree quick really applies to the MA, maybe more any other cartridge. I've got the 3002 and because the stylus are so unobtainable only play it as a special treat.

Dave/ChairSpud
Click to expand...

Wow pricey indeed !! Wonder if soundsmith could retip those old stylus ? would be cheaper than the nos replacements . I have MA cart on a Philips table that is on permanent loan to a buddy .don't know the model though but got a phone call a few months back and heard I am getting the table back at some point ?
 
ARJohn said:
Wow pricey indeed !! Wonder if soundsmith could retip those old stylus ? would be cheaper than the nos replacements . I have MA cart on a Philips table that is on permanent loan to a buddy .don't know the model though but got a phone call a few months back and heard I am getting the table back at some point ?
Click to expand...

Yes that does sound like it might be a better option, here's hoping your stylus comes back in good shape. :yes:

Was a thread a while back and KentTeffeteller said he had his MA 2002 retipped at Expert Stylus in England with a MicroScanner line contact stylus, said it cost him $250 and was very satisfied. That's probably the route I'll eventually go but am in no hurry. :D

Dave/ChairSpud

P.S. Just noticed you've got a Marantz CD53 and Adcom GDA-700...Nice, bet you like your CD's too! I've got a GDA-600 and love it!
 
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ChairSpud said:
Yes that does sound like it might be a better option, here's hoping your stylus comes back in good shape. :yes:

Was a thread a while back and KentTeffeteller said he had his MA 2002 retipped at Expert Stylus in England with a MicroScanner line contact stylus, said it cost him $250 and was very satisfied. That's probably the route I'll eventually go but am in no hurry. :D

Dave/ChairSpud

P.S. Just noticed you've got a Marantz CD53 and Adcom GDA-700...Nice, bet you like your CD's too! I've got a GDA-600 and love it!
Click to expand...

I will be interested to see what cart is on that Philips 212 if I ever get around to linking up again , just remember it was a MA that at that time I had never heard of and never listened to on my system .Picked the table up for like $20 if I remember cause he needed one . Pretty sure the stylus would be shot , not a guy that took care of his stuff and had really bad scratched up records .But now I am sort of interested to make the trip back there maybe just for the cart .

Yeah I like the Adcom but CD's don't get much spin around here as much as they did before the big "switching tables " thing hit me a few years ago and lots of dollars ago :D Black hole is what it is , but a good black hole .

cheers
John
 
flavio81 said:
What cartridges did you compare it to?

PS: It's a PIEZOELECTRIC (ceramic) cartridge, actually.
Click to expand...

It's an electret, which isn't the same thing.

I compared it to my Shure M3D, M7D, M91, V15 types I, II, III, and IV. None of them were in its class.
 
A short comparo to the Ortofon OM/Digitrac 200NE stylus combo and the MA wins by a nose. More detail, quicker, just a bit more musical. The OM cart with the nude elliptical Digitrac stylus is a VERY good MM combo. More review from more revealing system tomorrow!

Shot of the OM/Digi when it was on the DP-59L
picture.php
 
rnorton said:
It's an electret, which isn't the same thing.

I compared it to my Shure M3D, M7D, M91, V15 types I, II, III, and IV. None of them were in its class.
Click to expand...

I ran M-A piezo carts for a number of years and recommended them highly. They are in fact piezo-ceramic, the electret thingy is an inexplicably intentional misleading misnomer.
http://www.roger-russell.com/sonopg/micropg.htm
Extracted;
"The ceramic cartridge continued to evolve beyond what had been accomplished at Sonotone. The Micro-Acoustics cartridges had a different construction than Sonotone. The stylus arm was directly connected to the ceramic elements, an idea that was patented by Micro-Acoustics. The transducer elements were referred to as electrets, but were made of the same piezoelectric material, lead-zirconium titanate. The ceramic elements had resonance way above 20kHz to insure good response and separation to beyond 20kHz. The cartridges also had an internal microcircuit to convert the amplitude response of the piezo material to velocity equalization for use in a magnetic phono input on a preamplifier. This was electrically similar circuit to the Sonotone Velocitone adapters. The adapters were about 1-1/2” long and plugged into the magnetic phono input of the preamplifier. The back of the adapter accepted the phono plugs. "

OTOH,the Stax CPY cart was indeed a true electret with the required FET gain buffers in the cart body, stylus is not user-replaceable. Requiring a special interface/preamp, the cart-born front end transistors were sadly total crap that degraded the performance somewhat along with poor channel-to-channel balance in addition. Replacing them yielded by one stringent auditioner's estimation the best LP playback he'd witnessed, bar none.
http://audiokarma.org/forums/showthread.php?t=156126
 
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I can't say that I understand any of the tech talk--I am but a humble listener--but I own an MA 2002e. It is an excellent sounding cart indeed.
It's no wonder you seldom see them still running: They have the thinnest cantilever!!
I'd be willing to bet more of them were lost to accidents than to worn-out needles...
 
rnorton said:
It's an electret, which isn't the same thing.
Click to expand...

It is a piezoelectric ceramic cartridge. "Electret" is just a permanently polarized material.The ceramic cartridges have ceramic elements that have been polarized so... they're electrets. Now, "electret condenser" would be a different thing.

rnorton said:
I compared it to my Shure M3D, M7D, M91, V15 types I, II, III, and IV. None of them were in its class.
Click to expand...

Interesting!!
 
Well,
I had to go out of town for work and just got back, so no comparo's today. Thanks for all the great info on this cool little cart. :thmbsp:
 
flavio81 said:
It is a piezoelectric ceramic cartridge. "Electret" is just a permanently polarized material.The ceramic cartridges have ceramic elements that have been polarized so... they're electrets. Now, "electret condenser" would be a different thing.

Interesting!!
Click to expand...

I run an MA 3002 II - dug out the literature and it reads "Direct Coupled Electret Transducer"... "An extremely light, high-accuracy transducer, the eletret is a permanantly polarized dielectric device..." instead of magnets on each side of the cantilever with space between the magnets and cantilever there are electrets directly coulpled to the end of the cantilever.

Conventional Cartriges ....
For those that don't know ... the end of the cantilever has a coil of wire so when the cantilever moves back and forth between the magnets in space the coil generates an electrical signal. Of course there are variations on where the coils/magnets are located but you get the idea.

So with the MA carts, the top end of the cantilever is coupled to the electret ("magnet" /ceramic magnet/diectric device) so with coupling it is supposed to make the cart "faster" at transforming vibration of the needle into electrical signal since there's no space = no lag time ... that's the idea anyway.

BTW the stylus is USER replaceable, the replacement stylus is R-3002.

link to pic or 2002-e replacement:
http://i302.photobucket.com/albums/nn116/erw625/MA2002Estylus.jpg

Cheers,
Bob
 
LIVE! Cart shootout from BigBill's!

The table and carts are at BigBill's and we are swapping back and forth.

Audio Technica AT20SLa (Shibata)
Ortofon OM cart with Digitrak 200 NE (nude elliptical)
Micro Acoustics 2002e (.2x.7 elliptical)

For an MC comparison there is a nice Rondo Red on the Acrylic Plinth'ed Empire on a Linn Akito arm. Not a direct comparison but interesting nonetheless.

The MA is quicker than rhe AT, detail is very close. Just started playing and will report more. Stay tuned!

:music:
 
Bass....

Fasterdamnit said:
...............The MA is quicker than the AT, detail is very close. Just started playing and will report more. Stay tuned!

:music:
Click to expand...

I would agree that the Micro is faster than the AT, however the Micro seems to lack bass in direct comparison to the AT. I wonder if loading might be a factor here? :scratch2:
 
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